John McPhail (director)

Life and career

McPhail studied Cinematography at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. During his time there he met and formed a close working relationship with Tyler Collins and Andrew Lanni. After graduating from the Conservatoire he worked on the BBC television series Waterloo Road and was the assistant camera operator on the film Up There by Zam Salim.

In 2013 he formed his own production company Worrying Drake Productions and reunited with Collins and Lanni to produce a trilogy of short comedy films. The first film was the romantic comedy Notes which saw Collins in the leading role of Adam. The film told the story of a pair of roommates whose relationship develops through a series of post it notes. The film was warmly received by audicences and critics with Thomas Simpson of MovieScramble writing:

"In less than 10 minutes, McPhail has achieved what many feature films can not. A touching romance with a genuine humour to stop it from being too schmaltzy."

Later that year he released V for Visa and Doug & Steve's Big Holy Adventure which completed the comedy trilogy. V for Visa had its North American premiere at Robert De Niro's TriBeCa Film Centre in New York as part of the Bootleg Film Festival. The film went on to win the Best Director accolade at the festival.

Whilst filming the comedy trilogy, McPhail wrote a short 3 minute film called Just Say Hi to enter into the 2013 edition of the Virgin Media Shorts Competition. The film, starring Collins with Lanni in the role of producer, tells the story of a blossoming romance between a boy and a girl who meet every morning at a bus stop. The film made it through to the top 13 out of a short list of 250 films. Writing about his experience as a member of the judging panel, Robbie Collin of the Daily Telegraph said that Just Say Hi was:

"One of the sweetest payoffs I’ve seen in any rom-com this year."

The film proved to be a hit with the judges and with the audience at home winning 2 out of the 3 awards available at the festival making McPhail the only director in the competitions history to win multiple awards. The production team were presented with the awards at a ceremony in London which included £5,000 in film funding with mentoring from the British Film Institute and a voucher for £5,000 to spend on Nikon Equipment. The film was later picked up by the Très Court International Film Festival where it was screened in over 100 cites in 23 countries. With the success of his short films on the domestic and international festival circuit, McPhail launched a crowdfunding campaign to help fund his first feature film Where Do We Go From Here?. The campaign was a success, raising £10,630 in just two months. Production began in the summer of 2014 with McPhail directing the film in just 16 days in various location across Scotland including Falkirk, Alloa, Coatbridge, Glasgow and Loch Lomond. Speaking of his experience filming the feature to Impulse Magazine, McPhail said:

"It was the single best experience of my life. I didn’t eat or sleep for two and a bit weeks but I wouldn’t have changed it for the world."

After editing the film himself, McPhail began entering the film into festivals across the globe. The film was shown at the Cluj Comedy Film Festival in Romania which McPhail attended along with producer Lauren Lamarr. In late October 2015, the film was screened at the Sydney Indie Film Festival where it was nominated for 7 awards. Unable to attend the awards ceremony, McPhail was represented by his sister in law who happened to be travelling around Australia at the time. The film picked up three awards at the festival for Best Score, Best Supporting Actress and Best Film. Speaking to the National Newspaper about the awards success, McPhail said:

"I couldn’t believe we had won for our first feature film – we were jumping about in my kitchen going crazy when we heard. I would have liked to have been there but we had so much fun in the kitchen I’m kind of glad the way it worked out."

Upon hearing the news of McPhail's success in at the Australian festival, the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland posted a message of congraulations to him on their Twitter account.

Awards

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